We all know how it starts, don't we?

"'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house/Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse."

Clement Clarke Moore's doggerel, simultaneously tiresome and kitsch though it is, has a wider applicability to Hadleigh as a whole.

For our beloved town seems to have taken on the attributes of a lumbering sleepwalker. Everything about the place, alas, seems less-than-steady, slower and quieter.

Hadleigh appears to be in the middle of the Big Sleep, trapped into ever tighter circles of inactivity.

Even the boy racers throttle less often around the streets at the dead of night than they used to. Shucks: I almost miss 'em.

Yes, the Christmas lighting-up thingy provided a welcome spasm of activity and splashes of colour and sound. Well done to all involved. Our plucky independent traders have once again unfurled the tattered standard of quality and service in the face of Moronson's mighty mash-up of rubbish.

But otherwise all is not so well.

Politically, in stark contrast to their gobby predecessors, the current crop of Hadleigh's Babergh district council representatives are about as interesting and lively as mulch. Even Kathryn 'Grandone' Grandon, having been like a jack-in-the-box with a dodgy catch in the run-up to May's elections, has returned to her default quietist mode.

As I have no evidence to the contrary, I take their low profile to reflect their lack of activity on our behalves.

Oh, for the heady days of Queenie Dawson and her volcanic, vomiting word eruptions. Message to self: be careful what you wish for Taylor, old boy. I'm beginning to suffer from satirist's remorse.

Then there is the agonisingly slow progress being made to turn the old Babergh offices at Corks Lane from a replica of Gaza City into the promised land of bijoux houses and apartments for the smug and rich.

Every time I walk the Heavenly Hounds (Zechariah, Zephaniah, Malachi and Job) over the Conch, it seems progress continues to slow. Most recently, I could only discern maybe one or two extra bricks having been piled on top of each other, compared with my previous visit a week or so earlier.

I'm beginning to think the development may never be completed. One wonders if the project is in real trouble.

Perhaps that is the most appropriate outcome: a physical reminder of Babergh's appalling decision to up sticks away from its own residents and play the wannabe property developer.

Talking of which: I see that Stephen 'Baron' O'Leary has launched a Christmas Lights Turf War on the High Street. A bit like the Jets and the Sharks in West Side Story, the road is now divided between the Baron's gold and red heraldic colours and the more diverse non-imperial others. Truly the Empire is striking back.

Just you wait until Baron owns the whole of the main drag.

By the by, some of the traders I've spoken to are somewhat unimpressed with Mayor Gordon 'Jilted John' Mcleod's erectile efforts. Apparently, he and his Village People tribute act of volunteers (bless them for their good intentions, though) aren't always up to doing the erecting bit properly. Many tradespeople have opted out entirely or resorted to their own arboreal efforts.

The general quietening of dissent and scrutiny at Jilted John's Hadleigh Town Council, forced through by the town clerk, the 'Pirate Queen', has added to this sense of the place being slowly smothered.

Persistent correspondents (aka concerned citizens) have been gagged. Sub committees and working parties shut down. All in the name of, er, democracy? Surely some mistake?

You would have thought, being less accountable to the public, that Jilted John would have had more time to get his own house in order.

According to one of those self-same concerned citizens, let's call him S. Cribe, this might not be the case.

Mr Cribe has done some research and has spotted that Jilted John, has stated on his Town Council declaration of interests that he glories as an Internal Fire Consultant for Pyroactive Fire Protection Solutions Ltd.

He must be a very silent partner indeed as no such company is listed on the Companies House register of companies. Indeed, Mr Cribe asserts that no such company has ever existed!

Why would Jilted John claim to have an interest in a company that doesn't exist? Is he over-compensating for the aforementioned erection problems? What exactly is going on? We should be told.

Mysteries such as this used to be the topic of heated conversations within the town's many pubs. In my day there was, I recall, a ratio of roughly one pub to every two people, although myy memory, for understandable reasons is a bit hazy on that one.

But now there appear to be only three actually still trading. The Whites Hart and Horse have long gone. The Ram, of course, has been shut for a fair few years and is falling into disrepair. And now the Eight Bells has ceased trading.

During my earthly days, the brouhaha associated with our taverns provided me with the perfect material for sermons - and extracting extra donations to the collection by shamefaced locals.

At this rate, Hadleigh will soon be experiencing years of silents nights.

Sleep well, sweet town.